Monthly Archives: September 2021

[ad_1] We all know that choosing a theme is an important consideration for any WordPress website. Though, just as crucial is how much you spend on the theme itself. Of course, while free and premium solutions exist, it’s tempting to use either ‘flavor’ without understanding why. Choosing WordPress themes for free download is good decision in lots of cases. Even among free WordPress themes, you can find sub-categories. For example, you have freemium themes designed to make you upgrade. There are also free themes with big scopes and plenty of integrations. Of course, there are also simplistic, one-trick pony themes that are great for small blogs and niche sites. Selecting the right one will take some thought, although it’s not a complex task. As such, this post will discuss how to choose WordPress themes for free download, and what to look for. Before this, we’re going to talk about why a free theme could work for your website. Why Themes for Free Download Can Be Ideal for Your Site Free WordPress themes get a bit of a bad rap. This is, in part, due to design choices for the WordPress Theme Directory. It’s not intuitive, and the previews don’t give you the true scope of a theme. You can understand why every theme uses a default layout set by WordPress, but a number of themes can suffer. In other words, the presentation of free themes isn’t optimal, and it’s hard as a result to see the benefits of them compared to premium solutions. In our opinion, there are a few positives for using themes for free download: They cost nothing to use, which is the ultimate in a budget-friendly solution. A free theme could perform better than a premium version because it’s often presenting a stripped back feature set. Less elements to load means a faster site all around. Because a free theme can be more basic, you’re able to better customize your site using code and plugins. For some of these points, we’re offering a generalization to some extent. In fact, this is a good opportunity to talk about the differences between WordPress themes when it comes to cost. The Difference Between Free and Premium WordPress Themes Of course, the main difference between free and premium themes is the cost. Though, even here there are a few caveats to consider based on the type of theme you’re looking at. First though, let’s give you a quick rundown of how these themes differ in a broad sense: Free themes often give you no customer support. What’s more, there’s no update guarantee. It’s the classic ‘as-is’ warranty. With premium themes, the price you pay goes towards dedicated support, regular updates, and more customer-facing features. A premium theme means that a developer can dedicate more time and effort to the project as a whole. Because of this, you often get new features on a regular basis. There’s also more longevity. Within the broad scope of free and premium themes, you also get freemium solutions. These are often WordPress themes for free download, but with some kind of reduced feature set. The idea is that more desirable features require a payment to use. It’s fair to say that the majority of ‘useful’ themes within the WordPress Theme Directory are freemium, but there are great ‘free forever’ options too. Where to Find Free WordPress Themes for Free Download Speaking of the Theme Directory, this is a good time to discuss where to find WordPress themes for free download. Of course, the first place we recommend is the WordPress Theme Directory: This is the largest and most-focused collection of themes for free download around, so it makes sense to begin here. Each theme will show the same information: The developer, a version number, when the theme had an update, how many active installations the theme has, and a set of user ratings: There’s also a blurb for the theme, and some other details relating to translations, the number of downloads a theme has per day, and more. The point here is that each theme sits on a level playing field (which has pros and cons as we discussed). Elsewhere, you could also trawl theme developer websites for free solutions. We would recommend targeting those developers with good premium themes and reputations. It’s likely that a company will put a comparable amount of effort into all of its products, as it could impact user trust. For example, our sister site MeridanThemes has Meridian One: Though, hoping to stumble across a stellar free theme isn’t a viable strategy, especially if you’re short on time. Reading trustworthy WordPress blogs can help you here. Of course, WPKube offers lots of roundups on free themes, as do a number of other blogs. Though, you have to assess whether a blog has affiliations or other biases that may promote themes for reasons other than that they’re good. This isn’t always a red flag, but it helps to know this information before you opt for a theme. How to Choose WordPress Themes for Free Download (Without Compromising Your Site) While you may think choosing a WordPress theme for free download takes less effort than a premium solution, this isn’t true. In fact, it’s harder to see the relative merits and drawbacks of a free theme in lots of cases. This means you need to carry out more in-depth research for each one you consider. To do this, we have a four-point checklist for you: Settle on the key features and functionality your theme needs. Check out how much you can customize a theme, as this will give you more flexibility. See what other integrations are available for your theme, such as page builders, Search Engine Optimization (SEO), and forms. Read user reviews, weigh up the ratings a theme receives, and check out any other relevant information you need to make a decision. There’s lots to get through here, so let’s go! 1. Decide On What Your Theme Needs to Do For